After ten straight hours of bingeing on chocolate eggs, what eventually hatched was a scheme. Lacking a phaeton-and-four, it was a simple plan. (The author has just finished a Jane Austen book, and is thinking of seasides, horse-drawn carriages, and misadventures that result in stays of se’ennight, ending in marriage.)
It began as a casual suggestion on the part of the eldest: “This grass is so soft,” he said, staring up at the sky in the warm light of day. “We should sleep out here.” His younger siblings were immediately on board, catching him in a whim, a bluff, a passing fancy. They started drawing up plans, fancying themselves medieval travellers, caught out-of-doors on a much longer journey. It was a scheme as dreamed up by three children, aged 11, 7, and 4, lacking finesse, but making up for it with gusto. If there were older (or of a more literary bent), I believe they might have phrased it, “What need have we of a tent, mother? We shall survive by our wits alone!” As it was, it came out, “Oh, no. We don’t need anything. We’ve got our snowsuits.”
As the evening progressed, they acknowledged (as in the tradition of great role-playing games) that it might be a good idea to have a tarp in case of rain. And perhaps a bottle of water. And maybe a lantern. But that was it. At dusk, they set off for the back of the lot with their snowsuits in hand, still wearing only pajamas. “No, no!” I cried. “You have to put the snow suits on!“ Grudgingly, they put on their appropriate clothing for the chilly (getting colder) evening. 10 minutes later, they arrived back at the door, wearing only pajamas. “No,” I said. “If you get too cold, you won’t be able to get warm again. If you are going winter camping, you have to keep warm. You can’t warm up again. Please put the snowsuits back on.” (You can see that I play the part of the mother in this drama.)
The adults set off to light a fire in the pit at the other end of the yard, near where the children have discovered a pine-cone mine.
Several minutes later, the children, drawn to the fire, arrived with pine cones in hand, wishing to see what happened when they roasted them. The fire smoked and failed to catch in the long-unused and wet pit, the children danced around the smoke, trying to add things to the smoldering pile. The father became irritated. So I took a different role in the scheme, going back to the tarp with them. “May I join you on your tarp?” I asked. I was invited into the travelling band. We took up our places, and the middle child volunteered for first watch. We lay on our backs for some time, counting satellites and shooting stars.
The encampment
***
It is genuinely dark by this point, the clouds are parting, and the stars are plentiful above our heads. “You’re allowed to stay, if you want,” they say. “Do you want me to go?” I ask. “Um. A little bit yes, a little bit no,” says the middle child, my intrepid daughter. “No,” says the youngest. “You stay, Mummy.”
The girl has thought to bring a sleeping bag, and the youngest child becomes jealous. The oldest goes back to the house for blankets, and returns with a single light-weight polar fleece sleeping bag, into which the youngest is dutifully zipped. Laying on the ground (also in my snowsuit) I discover that a snowsuit and tarp alone will not keep the cold out of your legs. A 4-year old in a sleeping bag, however, makes a marvelous blanket. I recommend it. Eventually, though, my blanket loses his youthful enthusiasm, and starts conjuring canines hiding in the dark. “It’s too dark, Mummy. When the lights go out, you should be in the house.” It is decided. I will take him in, and bring back more blankets for the rest of the troupe. “Do you want me to come back?” The loons are making a racket on the river, the frogs are hollering at the tops of their lungs, and the mysterious howls of the neighbourhood dogs have started up. In short, the dark in our yard is starting to remind them that we live at the edge of the forest.
“I think I do,” says the oldest. “Yes,” says my intrepid daughter. “You can come back.”
I arrive back to find that they have (once again) removed their snowsuits and are wrapped up in the thin blankets over their pajamas. “Mom” comes out. “Put the snowsuit on. Do you remember the other day when you refused to wear a jacket and then you got so cold it made you cry and then you had to stand in the shower for 20 minutes to warm back up??? You can’t warm yourself back up if you get that cold! It’s dangerous!” (Why? Why is this an argument? Do kids LIKE getting hypothermia? I don’t understand, at all!) And, I fear, completely contrary to the spirit of the thing, I lay down the law. “You are not allowed to sleep outside unless you put your snowsuit back on and don’t take it off again.”
This is exactly why we don’t take our mothers along when hatching a scheme.
On the other hand, at least I provide a logical person to take first watch. After the snowsuits are (once more) grudgingly (once more) donned, we settle back down, with extra blankets. I can now report that a 4-layer tarp, plus double wool blanket, plus polar fleece wrap, plus snowpants will keep the cold out, at least when it is just below freezing. My nose is very, very cold, though. I’m a terrible night watch. I start falling asleep almost immediately, and keee pulling the blanket over my head. My eyes start to droop in a matter of minutes. “I don’t think I can take first watch. How about you,” I ask the oldest, initiator of the whole plan. “I’ll do it!” he says. A few minutes later, the daughter says, “I can’t sleep anyway. I’ll take first watch.”
A couple of minutes later, I ask, “What are we watching for?” “Oh, you know,” she says, breezily. “Coyotes. Foxes.” “What are you going to do if you see one?” “Mummy,” she says, and I can hear her hands on her hips and her rolled eyes. “We have a big stick, and we’re right next to the house. Besides, they’re more scared of us than we are of them.”
I’m not convinced, but I’m not going to let my irrational fears jeopardize a good scheme. Hypothermia from sleeping outside without proper protection? Likely. Coyote attack? Not worth the energy to conjure the thought.
It is only about four more minutes before things start to fall apart. “OK. I’m tired,” she says. “Somebody else take over the watch.” My son says maybe we should huddle for warmth. It is the beginning of the end. A few more minutes pass, me still staring straight up at the sky through the tiny gap in the blanket wrapped around my head. My son says, “I’m going in the house.” “Are you cold?” “Yes.” And he is up and gone. (Although, it turns out, to the still-blazing bonfire, not the house. Warmth and light are what he seeks.)
This leaves my daughter and I at opposite ends of the tarp, staring at the starry sky. “Are you cold?” I ask. “Not really,” she says. She pauses. “Do you want to come and snuggle with me?” I ask. “I guess so.”
So we rearrange the blankets and lie there for a few more minutes. “I think I’m ready to go in, now,” she says. “Only, could you go first?” “You want me to leave you here?” “Yes. But just for a few minutes. I want to come across the yard by myself. It might be a bit scary, but I want to try it.”
So I leave my middle child in the dark in the middle of a field… the one who is the thrill-seeker, the one that we think we’d better channel into extreme sports before she finds other things to fill that need. Right now, walking across the back yard in the dark by herself fills that need. And I go into the house. And a few minutes later, doesn’t she show up at the back door, carrying her snowsuit and sleeping bag, dressed only in pajamas? “That,” she says breathlessly, “was a little bit scary!”
Filed under: Creative Writing, Family | Tagged: adventure, children, PostADay2011, storytelling | 3 Comments »
“First World Problems”
Today’s post is unabashedly meta.
That phrase, “first world problem” has been kicking around my social media streams for a while. I *think* it started out as a reminder that whatever it was that was bugging you, you should have a bit of perspective on it. “Can’t get my phone to connect to my internet and my library books are due so I’m going to have to phone to get them to renew in person.” “First world problem.”
But then it became (as these things are wont to do) dismissive. People started making up mocking fake “problems” and adding, “Wah!” to it. “Bought a latte this morning and they were all out of cinnamon so I had to use *already ground* nutmeg.” Things like that.
This seems like an ideal time to link to an xkcd comic:
This morning, I found myself standing in a partially disassembled kitchen, unable to remove the faucet, unable to get the faucet to stop dripping, (and by dripping, I mean coming out of the counter and spraying water in a never-ending fountain) and with the drawers removed so that I could reach the cut-off valve because they did something profoundly weird when they installed the plumbing. No running water in the kitchen, can’t find the o-rings, child hanging around saying, “Mummy!” every two minutes, and due to a strange choice of the previous home-owner, I can’t just replace the faucet because… oh, it’s a long and drawn-out story. And then I thought, “I guess this is still a first-world problem.”
This is, however, where I draw the line on perspective. That’s it, right there. Running water. Hot and cold. On demand. I demand running water.
Any solution to the world’s problems must include running potable water in the kitchens of the world. Heated, so that we can keep our homes sanitary without having to drag water from the pump to the stove. I add those as parameters to my “ideal world”.
***
A couple of weeks ago, I told somebody I was going to write a post and call it “First World Problems”. I was going to start it like so: “Dead of a stress-induced heart attack at 46 is still dead.” Because there are problems of the industrialized world that are real problems. Alienation. Disaffectation. Disconnection from nature and the life-giving aspects of labour. Chronic high levels of stress and anxiety. Diabetes. Pollution, loneliness, the industrialization of everything including love. You know. Problems.
This morning’s experience gave me (as all my experiences tend to) another moment of insight. “First world problem,” I thought, as I struggled to get the water running in my kitchen again. Meaning, “all my habits are entirely reliant on technology, and when the technology fails, my ability to cope with the world around me deteriorates rapidly.” I kept finding myself turning the tap even when I was in the middle of fixing it. “Right. Still no running water. Just like 2 minutes ago.”
This reality applies not only to our lattes and information technology, but also to our water, food, transportation, energy, and to our ability to heat and cool ourselves as necessary. During the 2003 blackout, we discovered that our phone didn’t work when the power went out, so I had no way of calling home to say where I was. Another first-world problem, caused by the fact that I was working 100 km from home on a daily basis. And the gas pumps in between were also powered by the missing electricity. And the traffic lights weren’t working, so traversing the intervening city was a major undertaking. Our “world” is full of these unseen systems that allow things to happen magically.
It comes down to this: We are entirely dependent for the basic necessities of life on systems that are incomprehensible, unfeeling, and entirely outside of our control. We have no direct relationship with our life systems and no back up plan. And then… our life systems and our lifestyle systems are entirely enmeshed. This is how my car gets all my money. Even though I know it isn’t my priority, I can’t get at the things that are unless I maintain it… but then I can’t afford to get at the things that are my priority. And on and on and on.
First world problem.
And when I thought of it that way, the levels of anxiety that these (even minor) failures cause become more transparent. We live in a giant black box with a zillion points of contact, and all we know about it is the stories we’ve been told. At any time, the machinations of strangers in suits, playing dice games with dodgy mortgages could strip us of our live savings and eliminate our carefully planned retirements. Our security is illusory, and we are enraged to discover the cracks. A good time to remind ourselves, but for perspective, not dismissal.
First World Problem redux (1)
One day a few months ago my mother was visiting. (Hi, Mom!) I don’t remember what the topic was, but we were sitting on couches in a heated room, and the lights were on, and the water was not disconnected. It was probably a money thing. And she sighed, and said, “Oh, it’s a hard life.” (2) And I thought about it a moment, and said, “No. A hard life is when you have to live on a garbage dump and spend your days digging for enough plastic to buy some rice to feed your children. This is just an irritating life.” Which she conceded. But whatever it was, it really was irritating.
Here’s the deal: we’re still living in these bodies, and these technologies we have come to rely on are the only way we really know how to take care of them.
Water? Tap!
Food? Grocery store! (or sometimes garden, but if you’ve been reading along, you know that when the zombies come, I’m still in trouble.)
Money? Uh. If you solve this one, let me know. (3)
So, let us not use the phrase to pretend that there are no problems in the first world. Because those problems, these problems, these are the things that are causing the BIG problems. (4) We have lost perspective, yes. But we are still alive, and we still have needs. So if you catch yourself saying, “first world problem” under your breath, check in. Is it really not a problem? Are you using the phrase to gain a sense of scale, reality? Or are you trying to dismiss a need of your body or spirit, because you think you “should be” better than that? You know, don’t be too hard on yourself. But you might be willing to concede the small points as just not worth getting your knickers in a knot.
But running water? I stand by my requirement for running water. Even in more than one room in my house. (5)
1. That means restored/brought back, not summed up. Because every good blog post should have a glossary.
2. One of my favourite mom quotes is, “It’s a great life if you don’t weaken.” Hmmm… Things I learned from my Mom. Good blog post, no?
3. Traditionally, at least ’round these parts, it used to involve these things they called “jobs”, but those things are as scarce as hen’s teeth. I hear they were a recent (and apparently ephemeral) phenomenon, anyway.
4. That’s another entire post about consumerism as a balm for anxiety. Let’s not go there this time.
5. I also have a goal of donating at least $500 to UNICEF this year. Currently at about $105. Because I want safe potable running water for everybody, not just me.
Filed under: WorldView | Tagged: good-enough, social commentary, storytelling, water | 5 Comments »